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Konigstiger — Panzer IV
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Published: 2008-03-16 15:39:56 +0000 UTC; Views: 3476; Favourites: 51; Downloads: 56
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A german Mark IV panzerRelated content
Comments: 32
Did these tanks have a name, i.e., like Panther, Tiger, King Tiger?
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Na, that was around 1941-ish I think. Perhaps the British tank naming planted a seed in the German panzer designers' minds and with KV heavy tanks in the east in 1941 (named after the Soviet defense commissar and politician Kliment Voroshilov). Perhaps with everyone else naming their tanks the Germans thought to do the same after they battled the named tanks. The Panzerkampfwagen IV was the product of the rearmed Germany after Hitler rose to power in the mid 1930's. The Pz.Kpfw. IV was first built in 1936 before the panzer design staff battled other named tanks; the tanks of the Spanish civil war did not have named tanks en masse. When the panzer IV fell out of favour to be the main future battle tank for the German army the Panther was set in motion and was rushed into development after a bunch of upscaling the quick iterations and emphasis on future proofing the tank to be on the winning side of tank battles. Unlike what Germany endured with their panzers in 1941 with the Soviets with the T-34/76 and KV tanks dominating the (as Hitler put it) 'Fair weather panzers' that were designed with unrealistic design priorities for the pragmatic battle field of the mid-1940's world power battle field. The Panzer IV was designed as a 'support / auxiliary' tank originally that got forced into a main battle tank's job. Germany was quite ambitious at the time before the Second World War (as were the Soviets) but they failed to understand (not see) the faults in their long battle resources. In short they gambled on the wrong plan and over extended in a very non-conservative way; one could say even liberally.
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I understand. The Panzerkampfwagen (armored battle car) only had the numerical designation, as well as the lettering for upgrades. After the Panzer IV and 38(t) were getting their butts whipped by the T-34/76, that the Germans designers understood why the Russian tank was a bit better. The Tiger I came out in 1942 and first showed up in North Africa, but that was before they had all the bugs worked out of them. Hitler always thought, "bigger was better" which led to the Tiger II, Panther, and the ill-fated Maus.
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The Maus was cancelled somewhat early but Dr. Porche was snubbed too much from his other projects I suppose and pressed on anyway. He was kind of 'right' with the idea of a super heavy coming back into favour with Entwicklung 100 with the late German government but it was way too late in the war; it might have been called the 'Lion' Pz.Kpfw. VIII or VII. Death was pretty certain come the late Axis air inferiority and all; the troop knew it on both sides. You can visit the Maus for all of its troubles over in Russia though so there is that legacy of heaviest 'tank' tank (not mobile artillery) ever built 188 tons (not so much today tough it is an empty husk now) I suppose for what it is worth. Also the German crews always wanted more ammunition and a lot of battles ended when the ammunition ran out so I hear so perhaps that had something to due with the size (more internal volume with a bigger tank?) Either way lots to think about for a lot of middle and late war documents are missing. Including the miniature Panther prototypes (think of a Pz.Kpfw. IV scale panther).
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I like the latter idea. The problem of the later German tanks was switching from petrol to diesel to runs these beasts, and full efficiency was in the mud. Also, the wide tracks seem to have a tendency to break, and those interweaving road wheels make fixing a pain.
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Yeah you can see in the Entwicklung 50 that the interleaved road wheels were kind of done away with but not quite (they still had advantages but the road wheels like the Panther were only for heavy tanks and the medium tanks could do with semi-interleaved road wheels for maintenance ergonomics). They actually can still be used today but allied nations have habits and what not. Also the whole engine transmission in one 'power pack' idea was being thought of at this time. The front mounted drive was done away with for it was not 'combat practical' and to change a transmission on a Panther was hell. In short the Germans were trying to copy the allies' quick maintenance design solutions to better solve their horrible durability and work shop work issues. Too many panzers were stuck in the repair shop for too long. These kind of things were being addressed I suppose and give a year or two there would have been design solutions and more cast and rounded tank parts and like you said diesel engines. All in all the German design staff was being humbled and taking a more practical approach and getting 'new blood' into the drafting room after the old generation of designers were kind of coming up short in some areas like field maintenance. It might have been that the old blood was kind of stuck in the big ideas part of design and not enough people realizing how life was actually like for the panzer crews. Who knows right?
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Until the advent of the Tiger and Panther, their tanks still suffered from the simple concept of flat sides make for easier manufacturing. Allies went through the same problem, which is why you see pictures of Shermans with extra plates welding in vulnerable places. And why the Sherman was very plentiful was due to its ease of maintenance and repair. If it wasn't totally destroyed, you can pull parts off and spread them around to other tanks.
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Standardization was a big goal of the late Entwicklung series to emulate the allies practical maintenance design features. I was reading up on Hitler and a great deal of tank design features were only learned and incorporated after a side had captured an enemy vehicle. There was was no internet back then! It was all spies and encyclopedias. I guess it partially explains all of the various different designs and quirks of the different national tank designs back then. You had to go with what you knew or found I suppose.
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That was why the Sherman was the standard of the U.S. Army during the war. It was easy to maintain and easy to drive. So many of the earlier M3 Grants (or Lee to the British) were converted to mobile artillery as they shared so much with the M4. And getting away from the Wright Cyclone radial aircraft engine to a design that Chrysler/Dodge created for moving the Sherman around. It was basically 5 6-cylinder engine blocks melded into a pentagonal pattern around a single crankshaft. I had seen one on display at the now defunct Chrysler Museum in Detroit, MI. Talk about a mechanic's nightmare; but it was designed such that the whole engine/transmission unit could be pulled back at Depot for repair and a new or repaired power pack dropped in. The Germans had nothing like that.
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I remember a snippet where the Americans figured that since they were going over the Atlantic ocean the their tanks better ship easy and the tanks better not break down for in the American command's perspective a tank that is shipped across the ocean away from factories and breaks down is not worth anything but instead a deficit if the tank cannot operate when it is needed to operate so far away! The Russians had a similar concept of reliability and large manufacturing numbers over top of the line features at great prices but it was from a different mind set. Here is Hitler speaking in Finland (in abbreviation: he talks about how his 'fair weather' tanks were kind of crap compared to what Russia fielded www.youtube.com/watch?v=oET1Wa… )
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An interesting story about the T-34 was that they were still being assembled in the factory in Stalingrad while the fighting was still raging just blocks away. As soon as a tank came off the assembly line, it was fueled, armed and the crew would jump in and take it out into the fight.
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AH yes enemy at the gates and all, do you know that the KV-220 (with the 107 mm) was assembled and completed before Russia had a bit of an issue with the Germans in the early parts of the Russian-German conflict in the east? panzer35.ru/forum/47-17922-1
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Never heard of the KV-220. Was it a medium class tank? Couldn't access the site.
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It is a Russian experimental heavy tank. Think of a bigger KV-1 with a long 107 mm gun. There was no ammunition ready for the 107 mm gun so they threw the turret off as a bunker defense somewhere and plopped a standard KV-1 turret (which actually had lots of ammunition supply) on the hull and it become like a stretched out Limo KV-1 that was lost in battle. The whole project was kind of cancelled basically because Russia figured that in 1941 onwards that with Germany they (the Russians) did not need a big tank tank counter the then crappy smaller Pz.Kpfw. IIIs and IVs (how ironic when the Tiger I came about lol). Then the Tiger came along and the arms race was full tilt in earnest.
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And this was followed by the Soviets creating the JS-2 and 3. And when they paraded the JS-3, with it's 122 mm gun before the British and Americans watching the review, there were a lot of allied generals filling their trousers that day!
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The arms races was again in fill tilt! Ah how things stay the same the more they change eh? Look upon us now, Armata, Leopard 3, Abrams successor it goes on and on...
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But it'll be a long time before someone comes up with something like the AT-ST or AT-AT from 'Star Wars' or the hover tanks as found in 'Hammer's Slammers'!
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Don't be so assured in your ideals: www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePINYZ… (It is a bit corny I have to admit).
Here is where they win an investment competition: www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-g85l…
Here is another related video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jd4m7b…
More can be found on the linked YouTube channel and here at their website: www.megabots.com/
For the past 20 or 30 so years the world of real life 'things' has stagnated all around the globe. We are catching up to our own momentum that we lost so many years ago. With solid reliable computers for automation and with the manufacturing leap of 3D printing we may be soon to find things in the here and now that were fiction not even a decade ago. It is difficult to say, the future that is although only fools doubt the possibilities that the future can bring yet likewise we may be fools for chasing after things we have yet to know the full impact there of. The more things change the more they stay they same eh? The immortal human element and all that.
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Damn, so I parked it there! I was going crazy, looking for it!
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It sure looked like it was left there a while ago 
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You know, pizzas take a while...
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Must have been one hell of a pizza 
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There was a huge queue and only a guy attending people... 
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Thank you for information and sorry for my late reply.
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At the Military Museum in Bucharest.
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Another greate pic comrade.^^ I salute you for your awsomness. ^__^
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